{"id":429,"date":"2011-02-16T12:47:04","date_gmt":"2011-02-16T16:47:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ramchal.wordpress.com\/?p=429"},"modified":"2011-02-16T12:47:04","modified_gmt":"2011-02-16T16:47:04","slug":"sometimes-a-chariot-is-just-a-chariot-while-other-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/2011\/02\/16\/sometimes-a-chariot-is-just-a-chariot-while-other-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Sometimes a chariot is just a chariot while other times \u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

At one point in his comments to Petach<\/em> 7 Ramchal says that the whole array of God\u2019s governance, as exemplified by the traits of Divine tolerance (Chessed<\/em>), strictness (Gevurah<\/em>), and judiciousness (Rachamim<\/em>), constitutes The Merkava<\/em> (\u201cChariot\u201d) that the prophets were able to envision. We\u2019ll lay out the details of all this later on in this work but for now it\u2019s important to explore the concept of The Merkava<\/em> itself, since it has all sorts of associations in Kabbalistic and Rabbinic literature [1].<\/p>\n

The term Merkava<\/em> is mentioned quite a lot of times in Tanach, but the term is specifically taken to refer to Ezekiel\u2019s vision as recorded in the first chapter of his work [2]. But chariots themselves do play significant roles in Tanach.<\/p>\n

Pharaoh had Joseph ride in a\u00a0chariot\u00a0that would signal his coming to be second-in-command (Genesis 41:43, 46:29, and 50:9); King David’s heir-apparent Absalom was acquired a\u00a0chariot\u00a0along with horses and 50 runners to signify his stature (II\u00a0Samuel 15:1, I\u00a0Kings 1:5), and the prophet Elijah was said to have \u201cascended up to heaven in a whirlwind\u201d upon \u201ca chariot of fire (II\u00a0Kings 2:11). So a chariot was clearly an important indicator of prestige and ascendance.<\/p>\n

So, what\u2019s the significance of the Merkava<\/em> in the tradition, and why were we told that “The Account of the Merkava<\/em> should only be taught to the wise and to those able to deduce through wisdom on their own” (Chagiga<\/em> 2:1)?<\/p>\n

Notes:<\/p>\n

[1]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 For one thing, Ramchal refers there to the combination of Chessed<\/em>, Gevurah, <\/em>and Rachamim <\/em>as a \u201cherkava<\/em>\u201d (a blend), which is obviously entomologically related to merkava<\/em>. As such, the word merkava <\/em>itself could merely be a different construct of \u201cblend\u201d. But Ramchal purposefully and unequivocally equates it with the Merkava<\/em> that the prophets envisioned.<\/p>\n

[2]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In Mishna\u00a0Chagiga<\/em> 2:1 the chapter is said to refer to Ma\u2019aseh<\/em> <\/strong>Merkava<\/em> — an accounting of the Merkava<\/em> (experience). In fact, the term Merkava<\/em> isn\u2019t cited in that chapter at all (or in chapters 8 and 10 there which refer to vision).\u00a0But see I\u00a0Chronicles 28:18.<\/p>\n

(c) 2011 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman<\/p>\n

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org<\/a><\/p>\n

———————————————————-<\/p>\n

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here<\/a> at a discount.<\/p>\n

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here<\/a> at a discount as well.<\/p>\n

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).<\/p>\n

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence<\/a>\u201d and \u201cRamchal<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At one point in his comments to Petach 7 Ramchal says that the whole array of God\u2019s governance, as exemplified by the traits of Divine tolerance (Chessed), strictness (Gevurah), and judiciousness (Rachamim), constitutes The Merkava (\u201cChariot\u201d) that the prophets were … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}